The temperature was only 25 degrees, but the sky was clear and the sun was shining.

"The snow put some moisture in the track, which it needed," said Mark Guidry, who took three trips to the winner's circle in beginning the quest for his fifth Sportsman's jockey title in six years. "It was pretty dry Thursday morning.

"Today, I didn't see a track bias. I won from off the pace with one horse, on the lead on another and from the middle on another."

Guidry swept the $20.40 daily double, winning the first race with Just Like Perfect ($12.20) and the second with French Tryst ($4.80). He also won the seventh with G.W. Wish ($7.60).

Also riding three winners was veteran Ray Sibille, another of the Louisiana Cajun country's gifts to the Chicago racing circuit. Sibille, who took Sportsman's titles from 1978 through 1981, went to the winner's circle with Three Seasons ($6.40) in the third, Indeco Lovely ($6) in the fifth and Believe It Honey ($9.40) in the sixth.

The biggest payoff of the nine-race card was $26 from He's A Southerner in collaboration with jockey Lupe Macias in the ninth.

Opening Day marked the introduction of Sportsman's 10 percent bonus award on successful win bets at the track every Friday during the meeting that will run through May 11. The object of the win-bonus is to lure parimutuel customers to come to the track rather than make their wagers at off-track and intertrack locations and to play the live races rather than out-of-state simulcasts.

"Definitely a tremendous inducement," said Tim Bayer of Addison. "Watching the race on TV just doesn't match the excitement of being here."

Sportsman's paid $12,048 in bonus money to the win bettors. Mutuel director Terry Hart said the on-site win pool was $165,000, and pointed out that this was a substantial increase from the first three Fridays of June 1995 when full-card simulcasting was introduced. Those on-site win pools were $96,000, $116,000 and $130,000.

A total of $2,003,388 was bet on Sportsman's nine-race program and of that amount $510,267 was wagered on site.

On Opening Day last year, before the legalization of full-card simulcasting, $2,431,276 was bet on the live program with $812,471 of the cash going through the on-track mutuel machines.

Hart estimated final tabulations would show about $1.1 million was wagered on the simulcasts from Gulfstream Park, Oaklawn Park and the Fair Grounds at all Illinois locations.